Party 'not disbanding ANCYL'

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ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe on Sunday confirmed the future of the ANC Youth League would be discussed at a high-level meeting this week.

The party's highest decision-making body, the national executive committee, will meet on Friday, a day before a mass rally.

This comes after the party's national elective conference last month decided to let the newly elected NEC decide the relevance of the league.

There have been reports that the ANCYL had been forced to toe the political line and tone down its attack on ANC leader Jacob Zuma, following the outcome at Mangaung, where the ANCYL's presidential candidate Kgalema Motlanthe lost by an overwhelming majority to Zuma.

The league's former president, Julius Malema, was expelled from the ANC and now faces criminal charges for his alleged role in securing a tender for a company that his family trust owns shares in and receiving kickbacks from those deals.

His expulsion brought the relationship between the ANCYL and its mother body to a critical low, but Mantashe said they were looking to the future.

"The focus is not disbanding the youth league. The focus is to making the youth league work as a structure."

Mantashe said the ANC was focusing on how to improve its public image ahead of the general elections next year.